UNC Chapel Hill vs Temple University

College Search & Selection
1

Hello everyone, I have narrowed down my last two college options to UNC Chapel Hill and Temple University. Making my final decision, however, has given me a lot of trouble and sleepless nights.

It is no secret that Temple isn’t in a great neighborhood. My parents are rightly concerned about my safety if I choose to go there. While I understand that, Temple is in Philidelphia, and I like the urban campus (without going a few blocks over). I didn’t get to tour it with students there but I think I have a good vibe from it. The city has so many opportunities and it would be a refreshing new environment that would challenge me.

UNC Chapel Hill, on the other hand, seems like the obvious choice to everyone else and their mother. It’s a top rated school with great academic rigor, and I do like that everyone there is generally more academically inclined than at Temple (no offense to Temple, but UNC is definitely more selective). I’m just worried that it’s the safe option while Temple has more risk between loving/hating it. I feel like I’ve hyped myself up so much about Temple that I no longer have excitement about Chapel Hill.

I’m worried that because I live in NC and Chapel Hill is so close by that I’ve let myself discount it. I know it seems like an obvious decision, but it’s not. Yet even as I try to convince myself to go the other way and choose Temple, I can’t make that decision, either. Every time I go to talk to my parents about it, I feel more discouraged. I know that no matter what they say about supporting me, they’ll be disappointed if I choose Temple. I would commit and ignore them just to spite them, but I don’t think I have that kind of unconditional passion for Temple.

Another thing is that my twin is going to Chapel Hill. That’s not making my decision for me, but I don’t want to go on Chapel Hill and rely on her and never make my own friends. I’ve never been great at making friends. I’m worried that Temple might be too challenging for me socially, but Chapel Hill could be too easy. I don’t want to rely on my sister like I have for all of high school.

This isn’t a situation where I 100% want Temple and hate Chapel Hill, because I don’t. Otherwise, it would be easy to just spite my parents and commit. I literally don’t know what direction to turn and I have five more days before the deadline. While my parents’ opinions are troubling me, I feel the need to reach out on here and get some other opinions. If it helps, I want to major in some kind of communications, right now I’m interested in PR.

If anyone can help me and just give info/opinions, I would be very grateful. I’ve done my own research, but nothing blaringly obvious is telling me to pick one or the other, nor to rule either out, and I don’t know where else to look.

Thank you.

2

Another factor: with Chapel Hill in state and my scholarship at Temple, Temple is about 1/2 the price of Chapel Hill for me.

3

That’s a great deal at Temple!

Still, I would go with UNC. Excellent school that a lot of out of state students would kill for. It’s well regarded outside of the state. It’s also a big enough school with enough OOS students to make a different group of friends, and you and your twin can decide whether to hang together or not. With your parents on board, and going away to school even if in state, you could go away for grad school.

For $24K/year, it’s an absolute bargain, even if it’s more per year.

4

Forgot to mention: at Temple I’m in Honors, UNC I’m not. This isn’t an argument against UNC however as Honors doesn’t have priority class registration there and I’ve heard the Honors program doesn’t matter much as academic challenges are there for non-Honors kids and, like I said, UNC kids are generally more academically inclined.

5

@lemongirl7 , I use John Willingham’s Publicuniversityhonors website to look at Public Honors Colleges. While I’m sure it’s a fine program, Temple isn’t listed in the Top 50. https://publicuniversityhonors.com/new-top-programs-by-category/

Overall, you would have a hard time arguing that Temple is a better school than UNC.

The arguments for going to Temple are breaking away from home on your own and cost.

The arguments for going to UNC are it overall is a better school, it’s closer to home where your parents are more comfortable, and UNC is a top 5-10 public university.

I grew up in the Midwest. I wanted to go to UNC years ago but got waitlisted. Went to Michigan instead. Our HS valedictorian turned down Harvard to go to UNC as a Morehead Scholar. That tells you the caliber of the school. You will meet people from all over, especially the Northwest, at UNC. Not just from NC.

Be honest with yourself and write down on paper or in Excel the qualities you are looking for in a school. Rate them 1-5 with 5 being best 1 worst and 3 average. Some of the possible topics to rate are: Overall Academics, Honors program or not, Location, Cost, Big Time Athletics (if that’s your thing), Social Life, Greek Life, Reputation of school, Value of degree with employers and grad schools, etc.

One more thing–if you want to challenge yourself socially, consider spending your junior year or a semester abroad. I did it in grad school and it was one of the highlights of my life.

Once you honestly, and I mean honestly, total the scores up, you should feel better about your decision, and you can share it with your family.

6

Go to UNC and don’t have a second thought about it. The number of people I know who went to UNC and didn’t love it is at max 2 – and that’s because they had personal issues that would’ve affected them regardless of where they went. Career opportunities at UNC are 10x better than Temple. Even though Temple is in an urban environment, it’s not in a great part of Philly and the name won’t be as impressive. UNC may not be urban but it has a beautiful campus and is a short drive from the more urban Durham and Raleigh areas.